I plan to leave my mark on the baseball world; this is where it all begins.

Meet Your 2010 Draft Picks: Anthony Ranaudo

Anthony Ranaudo was drafted in the 11th round out of high school by the Texas Rangers, but he chose to attend Louisiana State University. During his time there, he led his team to a national championship. He went 12-3, posting a 3.04 ERA with a WHIP of 1.15. During his 2010 season, though, he was injured, and did not have the easiest time bouncing back. The Red Sox drafted him in the compensatory round, and he was the 39th overall pick. During the summer, he dominated in the Cape-Cod League, where he didn’t give up a run in 29.2 innings. In the following interview, Ranaudo discusses how he matured as a pitcher in college, how he is adapting to professional hitters, what he learned from his injury, and more.

So how has it been here so far, playing professionally? Because in college, it’s more about winning, but here, it’s more about development.

Yeah, it’s totally different. There’s a bigger picture. It’s about longevity and staying healthy and having a good career, but I’m looking
forward to it. This is what I’ve wanted to do my whole life.

Were you drafted out of high school as well?

11th round by the Rangers.

What were the factors in your decision between going with the Rangers and playing at LSU?

At that time I was only 17–I’m kind of young for my grade–so
I was kind of young. I wasn’t ready to be on my own yet–just the demands
that pro ball would have had on a 17 year old kid, I don’t think I
was ready. I needed to go three years of college [to]mature and kind of
learn the game a lot more. Being in New Jersey I kind of played basketball–I played 20 games a year [of] baseball, so I needed to learn the game, be around the game more. Now I feel like I’m well suited for the game and
ready for pro-ball.

So when you say “learn the game,” what do you mean by that, and what did you learn in college?

[The] unwritten rules–just how to play the game, [and] awareness: what you need to do; how you need to prepare yourself; knowing
my body, knowing what kind of pitcher I am, knowing players around me, knowing
hitters–just the stuff that you learn… scouting reports and just the daily grind–college isn’t the same as pro ball–it was a stepping stone, and now I feel
like I’m ready to take on a full season here.

So what kind of pitcher are you? What’s your arsenal like? How has it changed since high school, and how have you changed?

Well like I said, I’m more mature. In high school, I got rattled if I gave up a hit or didn’t do as well. I kind of unfolded a little
bit, and I think that’s what I meant when I said that I needed to go to college
and mature a little bit. Now I know that each time I go out there its
just one start;its just a piece to a puzzle. Like I said, it’s a long road, so I cant
get unraveled about one bad outing, or one bad pitch, or one bad inning, so I
think I’ve matured a lot since high school. As far as my arsenal, I throw a
fastball. I’m a fastball pitcher: I pitch my fastball; I throw anywhere from 90
to 95, anywhere around there, and then I throw a good curveball, and then
I have a pretty good feel for a changeup, so I throw three pretty solid pitches.

You were in the playoffs a lot in LSU–definitely a good college team to be on–how do you think that contributed to your development, being in those high-pressure situations?

I think [it has] prepared me tremendously. I’ve played in front of
the most hostile crowds, huge crowds you could pry play in college. Every
weekend LSU draws the best crowds in college baseball. We would have 10,000
almost every Friday when I pitched, so I’m used to pitching in front of big
crowds, and then we went to the most pressured situations in the regionals, the
super-regionals… I pitched in front of 30,000 in Omaha for our national
championship, so I think it’s [going to] benefit me–not necessarily earlier in my
career, but later in my career when, hopefully, I can make the big leagues, and
then I’m pitching in front of 30,000 people and millions of people on TV. Hopefully I can go back to those days where I can pitch and throw in front of
30,000 people in big situations and just tell myself that I’ve been there before,
relax, and just be me.

What was your biggest challenge last year?

Last year there [were] a lot of challenges. I got hurt, so that
was pry the biggest challenge I had to overcome, and when I overcame
that injury and I was finally healthy, I didn’t have anywhere near the success
that I was expected to have, and that I expected of myself, and that my my team
expected of me, so that was pry a really tough challenge to overcome. I did
overcome it: I had a good summer, and I think that those were all learning
lessons and life lessons, and that was part of what I said, me maturing, and I
think I’m a better pitcher now.

With you saying that you weren’t able to live up to your expectations and stuff like that, do you kind of attribute that to the injury?

No, I hate to blame stuff on the injury. I was healthy when I
came back–whether it was rushed or just being in not the greatest place
mentally because I had missed four or five weeks–I just wasn’t locating my
pitches as well, and it seemed like every time I missed a spot or something,
someone took advantage of it in a big way, and that’s why
all my numbers were inflated, I just didn’t hit my spots, didn’t have great
command of all my pitches; my curveball wasn’t as sharp, and that’s just all on
me. I just wasn’t as prepared as I could have been, and like I said, it’s just a
learning experience, and I’ll know better now if I ever get hurt again just to be
better prepared when I go back into the games.

Now in college obviously players can kind of take advantage
of your mistakes more because of the aluminum bats. So now that you’re here
pitching against wooden bats–obviously you’re gonna have more experience
starting with spring training–do you have to change anything when it
comes to wooden bats?

I think it’s gonna benefit me. As a pitcher, I’ll be throwing to
contact a lot, which means I’ll be throwing more to make the hitters swing, and
make the hitters put the ball in play, so that way I can go deeper into ball
games and have less of a pitch count and be more efficient as a pitcher. Whereas in college, if you throw more down the middle, if you throw to contact,
you’re more likely to give up cheap hits, and then hits that will go a lot
further, and hits that will be hit harder. With wood bats it’s [going to] be a little
more true, and you can throw to contact more and try to be more efficient.

So let me get this straight: in college you’re more of the strikeout
pitcher because if you make the mistake, they’ll be able to hit it, but
professionally you can pitch to contact more because its wooden bats, and they’re not
going to be bale to take advantage of your mistakes as much.

The hitters are obviously better hitters at this level, but
with that said, they’re still hitters, and the way a pitcher looks at it, the best hitters fail seven out of ten times. With
that said, you can throw to contact, and that’s what pro-ball teaches you: You throw
to contact, try to get outs quicker, try to keep the ball down so you can get
ground ball outs, and keep your infield and your team involved, and keep your
pitch count down, and go deeper into ball games, and hopefully, like I said, stay
healthy and have a longer career.

In college, you probably had the same catcher, but here you won’t have that: you’ll have guys coming in and out all the time. Are you going to be less comfortable because of that?

I don’t think I’ll be less comfortable: it’s part of the job–it’s part of the career–there will always be catchers going in
and out, always have a bullpen catcher or a game catcher, and youre
always [going to] be moving out, moving around throughout your career, so I don’t
think it’ll be that big of an adjustment. It’s something that never really has
bothered me or helped me really. It helped me a little bit in college because my
catcher was my roommate–one of my best friends–but that was a pretty rare
occasion so I don’t think it will bother me too much [here.]

Do you let the catcher do the thinking and call the pitches, or are you more prone to doing that yourself?

I sit down with the catcher before I go out there,

and kind of give him a game plan of what I want, and if [he] and I are on the same
page, I just tell him ‘hey man, I’m just [going to] go with what you call.’ I very rarely
shake off unless I have a pitch that I definitely want to throw, and he didn’t
put it down, but most of the time, the catcher has the best view. They know the
hitter–they are the hitter–so I like to go with what catchers call, so that way
you’re both on the same page all the time, and that keeps the catchers confidence
up too, and that way you guys work better.

What do the catchers say when they come out and talk to you? I have always wanted to know that.

Just depends on the situation. Like I said, my
roommate from college would come out, [and] he would know what to say to me. He would
kind of just fire me up a little bit–probably not something I would say during
an interview–that’s the kind of stuff that he would say to me, but in a game
when a catcher doesn’t really know you, or he is just a teammate or whatever, he
just kind of tries to make you feel better, tries to tell you what’s going on,
tries to separate you from that moment: ‘hey take a breath, just relax, just take a
second real quick, I’m just coming out here just for you, just a break’ and you’re
like alright cool, just regroup, refocus. Then you step back out there on that
rubber back to competing.

You pitched in the Cape-Cod League and you dominated (no earned runs in 30 innings), what did that do for your development? What did you see that as an opportunity for?

Well I saw it first and foremost as an opportunity to bounce
back and overcome adversity. I went into last summer [with the mentality] this is [going to] either make me or break me as a ball player: either I can go into the
summer and have the same terrible summer I had at spring, or I can kind of flush
out spring and say, ‘Hey, this is a brand new start, and I can overcome adversity
and show people what kind of pitcher I am; what kind of makeup I have, and I had
a great focus all summer. I stayed with a great family: they allowed me to be who
I was, and get into a good routine, and I had a great coaching staff, and a great
routine, and great guys to back me up and to work with. I kind of just turned it
around and said, ‘I’m gonna make a change here. I’m gonna start new. I’m just [going to] go
out and compete and show everyone that I can overcome adversity, and that’s
definitely [going to] help me throughout my career, and that’s [going to] be a big turning
point in my life and in my baseball career.

Now that you’re playing professionally, you have to kind of anticipate a higher level of hitting. So what exactly are you anticipating?

I just know that–I haven’t actually pitched an inning in pro-ball –but what I have heard, and what I know is that pro-ball hitters
are very intelligent. They’ve been around the game a lot longer than college guys
and high school guys have. Some of these guys have been playing minor league
baseball or have even major league experience, and then when I get to the major
leagues they’ll all have big league experience. They’ll know pitchers; they know
tendencies; they know sequences, so I think the biggest thing for me is to learn
how to adapt to their type of game, and go off them, and make adjustments to the
way they hit, and counteract the way they’re thinking about me. I think that’s the
biggest test, but it’ll be fun.

Do you change your approach at all depending on whether or not the hitter is a lefty or a right-handed hitter?

Definitely. I kind of use different pitches in different
counts with righties and lefties. I might be more likely to use a breaking ball
early to a righty; whereas, I’ll use a breaking ball late to a lefty as a strikeout
pitch, and use a changeup more to a lefty than I will to a righty. It’s not
that different, but there are certain differences.

What’s the biggest thing you’re working on this spring?

Staying healthy and longevity. Just knowing that this is [going to] be a 142 game season, or whatever it is for the minor leagues, and then I’m [going to] have to make whatever it is, 25-30 starts, and I’m pry [going to] have to pitch
120-150 innings, somewhere around there… maybe if I’m lucky, if I stay healthy, if I
have success. So just try and stay healthy, stay focused, and keep a good
attitude and just try and learn as much as I can about pro-ball in my first
season.

If you had to hit against yourself, what weaknesses would you take advantage of?

I would make myself throw my fastball for a strike. I pry
would take all kinds of offspeed until I got a strike with the fastball, and
then kind of make adjustments, but I don’t even know what it would be like to
think as a hitter anymore. That’s weird, I’ve never thought that.

What do you think fans overlook or take for granted the most when it comes to baseball–especially the minor leagues or the college level?

Probably all the hard work that we put into the game and the
dedication. They just think that–not all fans but some fans–think that we just
come out here, [and] it’s a picnic. It’s a great game to play, but some people don’t know all the hard work–the time, the effort–they just
think that they come out here; they make a ton of money; they live the great life–and we do live the great life: we get to play a game that we love for our
career–but pry the hard work, and the effort, and the time behind the scenes that
go into the game, and all the things that peope don’t know about I would say.

What was the bright spot of your college career?

Definitely winning a national championship my sophomore year. That team, those guys on the team I’ll be friends with my whole life, and when you
win a national championship–those memories you make together, and the stuff that
we went through, the ups and the downs–just creates friendships that are [going to]
last forever, and those are definitely going to be the best memories of my
college career: the friendships that I’ve made and the teammates that I’ve
played with.

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